To curb its rising violent crime rate, Oakland brings in a team of security advisors

Oakland’s hired the crime consultants and approved the $250,000 bill, setting in motion the plan to bring in six law enforcement experts—including former Los Angeles top cop William Bratton—as the city’s latest attempt to curb its rising violent crime rate.

The group, which works for law enforcement advisory company Strategic Policy Partnership, will be in Oakland for six months. Though the company is based in Massachusetts, its consultants hail from East Coast states including New York and Florida. Strategic Policy Partnership has previously advised other big city police departments, including those in Detroit, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Advising will occur in two phases—first, the group will determine a short term crime reduction strategy, including implementing an expanded version ofCompStat, a program through which crimes are mapped so law enforcement officials can see where patterns occur and allocate resources to the areas with the highest crime rates. Phase two will focus on the community’s role in crime reduction and will involve numerous interviews with neighborhood groups and city officials, as well as a community review of the proposed crime reduction strategies.

In a four-part series that will be published over the next two weeks, Oakland North will look at why the consultants were brought in, who makes up this new group, how Bratton became a big name in policing and what issues residents think the consultants should tackle first.